Skyrim: The Guardian of the Wilderness
by Freddy Jr
Summary: The tale of the Dragonborn, as told by him, contains violence, murder, family problems, and murder. Oh and a big black dragon hell bent on eating the world. Characters contain, but are not limited to: Chichnic the Dragonborn, A spriggan matron, Ulfric Stormcloak, Ralof of Riverwood, Kynareth, several Daedra, the Greybeards, some assholes in the blades, some Altmer bitches, and more
1. Chapter 1

This is the tale of the me, the Dragonborn, known throughout the nine holds and beyond as a hero, a villain, or sometimes a bit of both. But what truly happened is something so unremarkable, that it will only ever be told by others with great embellishments. For me to tell you what truly happened though, we will need to start from the beginning...

Sundas, 7:09 AM, 17th of Last Seed, 4E 201

It was a foggy morning when I woke up to the rocking of a wagon. I slowly opened my eyes and try ed to rub them when I realized they were bound with rope. Panic began to rise in me as I began to look around for mother. I hadn't seen her or heard her chittering since, and it all came flooding back, the battle that began near us passing by, the soldiers screaming and dying around us, and mother trying to get me to run away from the battle. Then I remembered the pain in the back of my head as one of the legionairs knocked me out, my last sight being my mother's legs disappearing into a tree. I looked around and saw I was joined by three others, all with their wrists bound, one with a simple muzzle, him I recognized, if only slightly.

"Hey, you. You're finally awake." The man across from me said. "You were trying to cross the border right? Walked into that imperial ambush, same as us, and that thief over there."

At this point I tuned them out, as it had more important things on my mind, I cared little about these Nords and Imperials, their war was making it harder to survive in the wilds. So as I gazed out into the trees, trying to spot mother, who I could almost guarantee was following this caravan, I heard a name I remembered quite well from my earliest memories, a name I grew to both hate, and cherish, my true father, Ulfric Stormcloak. I turned to look at him with both shock and fury clearly burning in my eyes. He noticed this and turned his head just enough to look at me, when his eyes came over with slight recognition and fear, though the rest of his face was unreadable. As I stared into his eyes I heard another two names that made my blood boil, General Tullius and Thalmor. I turned to look at them, wishing that my hands weren't bound, so I could end their lives and hopefully the war that plagued and destroyed the land. As we rounded the tower, I realized that the other wagon was stopping. I also noticed the man with a black hood and a large halbred, if he planned on using that, it would mean we were to be executed. I mostly ignored everything else until I heard the nord across from me mumble something about the gods and waiting, I nodded and began to get off of the wagon, jumping down and moving into the small group. I looked at Ulfric and noticed he was looking at me through the corner of his eye as if he was worried. I glared back at him as I heard some imperial woman shouting something, then another imperial, this time a man, calling names, first Ulfric's, then the nord who was always talking, his name it seemed was Ralof, the thief, who for some reason tried to run, only to end up with two arrows in his back. Finally he got to me, but it seemed he was confused as I likely wasn't on his list.

"You there, step forward. Who are you?"

"Chichnic is my name. Once I was called To rag Stormcloak, Bastard son of Ulfric Stormcloak, grandson of Hoag, the Bear of Eastmarch." This drew a great deal of attention from everyone around the village square.

"But...you're an Altmer..." the Imperial soldier said quite confused.

"Only half, the blood of Skyrim flows through my veins as well."

"Captain, what should we do? He's not on the list." He whispered

"Forget the list, he goes to the block." She said quite plainly.

"By your orders captain. I'm sorry, at least you'll die in your homeland."

I felt a sudden change in the wind, as if a storm was brewing, but much more powerful and moving faster. "Now whoever said I'd be dying today..." I mumbled to myself, pondering on what could make such a wind possible. I followed the captain bitch to the group and waited. I began going over legends my mother had told me over the years. Ones that only the creatures of the wild knew were true. I heard what could have been a roar of some kind, and my mind instantly came to one conclusion. Dragon. Could it be true? One of the Stormcloak soldiers were led to the chopping block as I pondered this, just after his head rolled into the basket, I heard another roar, this time much closer.

I realized that I was next in line for the block and was being told very angrily to move. I did so with ease, looking at the sky the whole way there. As I was pushed on my knees, I saw Ulfric shed what looked like a tear, I could only suspect that it was for the man before me, as he hadn't seen me in more than a decade. As I was pushed down, I quit thinking as best as I could, and turned my gaze as far as I could to the sky. The forms of the headsman and tower taking up most of my view, to my disappointment. As I waited I saw what my pondering had led to, a dragon closing in on the village. It quickly landed on the tower, knocking over the headsman, and began to, what I could only guess it was doing, shout in its ancient voice.

From there, everything went straight to Oblivion. Fire began raining from the sky, buildings began to catch fire. I was knocked to the ground and tried to get back up. I struggled for a moment, as my hands were bound, but managed to get to my feet. I heard the nord's voice call for me to follow him, and follow him I did. We made our way to another tower, where we found several injured Stormcloaks and my father, now free of muzzle and bindings.

"Torag!" My father called to me. He grabbed me and hugged me as well as hard as he could. "I can't believe it's you! I haven't seen you since"

Since I was kidnapped by those bandits, I remember quite plainly. I've relived that day many times in my dreams."

"But how are you alive? I feared you were dead, or worse, captured by the Thalmor."

"I survived thanks to a clan of spriggans, the matron of said clan took me in, and raised me. But right now isn't the time for this conversation."

"You're right, we need to move now!"

"Up through the tower, let's go!" Shouted that Ralof man. And up we went, only to see the dragon burst through the wall and kill the poor sod that was moving rocks up top.

"Follow me!" I yelled as I jumped over the gap between the hole in the wall and the mostly destroyed inn on the other side. I landed with a roll on the second floor of the inn quite easily due to practice in the forest. I looked back to see them moving back due to the dragon flying over the inn. I thought I heard Ralof say something about meeting me later or something, so I continued through the inn.

I jumped down to the main floor and rushed past the Imperials and a boy next to his father, and nearly got stepped on by the dragon who landed near the boy and man. I made my way behind the house that was nearby, and continued through another burning building to make it to an open area in the village. I quickly spotted General Tullius and rushed the bastard, I tripped him, knocking him to the ground, and stomped on his chest with as much force as I could muster. Despite wearing armor, I heard a distinct double snap of a pair of ribs breaking. Satisfied, I fled to the main fort, where I spotted Ralof waving me into one of the doors.

We made our way to the circular room inside. Where he spotted what I presumed to be a friend of his laying in a puddle of his blood. I heard him mumble something about Sovenguard or something and just ignored it.

"A dragon attacks an imperial fort... where did it come from I wonder..."I muttered to myself.

"Hey, you better grab Gunjar's gear, he won't be needing it..." I nodded to him and began to get my scrap clothing torn off, and began removing the dead Nord's armor to put on myself.

"What happened to my father?"

"I don't know, we got separated and I haven't seen him since." At this he began checking the doors to the room. "Jarl Ulfric has told me a lot of things about him over the years, but the fact that he had a child... I just don't know what to say."

"There's nothing to say, Kyne this is crap armor, he thought I was dead and I hadn't seen him in more then a decade."

"How old are you?" He asked as he went to the gate on the other side.

"Uh... let's see... I was five when I was kidnapped... it's been twelve winters, so about seventeen. How's those doors comming?"

"No good, the one needs a key, the other has pull chains on the other side. Wait... imperials! Hide so we can fight them off!"

I immediately prepared my flames spell in both hands, ready to burn the Imperials to a crisp. As the gate fell I lit up the entire doorway in flames, killing the soldiers nearly instantly. I then began to remove the heavy armor from the one soldier when I realized she was the captain that ordered my death. I pulled out the iron axe I got off of Gunjar and hacked off her head in a couple swings. I then took her head and slammed it onto a torch, making sure it wouldn't fall off anytime soon. I went back to her body to finish removing her armor while Ralof stared at the head in horror. "Why did you do that?!" He cried out as I began trading the armor of Gunjar's for the stronger imperial armor that was worn by the captain.

"It's more then she deserves, if I had killed her outside with the means of getting through the gates, I would've fed her to a bear." This drew an even more horrified look from him. "Hey, you kill them too,"

"But in combat, and we don't mount their heads on pikes! That's dishonorable!"

"Yeah, well, what you call honor, I call stupid. I would've much preferred giving a bear a free meal, but that's not possible right now, so I have to deal." I finished putting on the armor, it not even bothering me, as I constantly carried heavier things in my pack on my travels with mother.

We began to make our way through the fort, killing a dozen or so imperial soldiers and several frostbite spiders until we hit a much larger chamber. This, from the smell, was the home of a bear.

"Brown bear." I whispered to Ralof. "Just go around, I'll keep her from killing you." This drew a confused look from him, but he nodded in understanding. I walked up to the bear, slowly, she looked up at me, likely smelling the wilds on me, and let me pet her head, keeping her calm as I fed her a cold chicken breast I found in one of the higher floors. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Ralof a good distance from me and the bear, with his jaw hanging in shock. I finished petting the big girl, and slowly walked away, moving to the soldier and following the path that we presumed would lead us out.

"How did you do that?" He asked, the shock clearly still on his face.

"With ease, I didn't approach her as if I wanted to do harm to her, plus, I've been around bears most of my life." At this, we turned a corner to see light flooding in through the exit. However, an entity stood in the entrance.

"Spriggan!" Ralof cried as he began to draw his axe, however he fell flat on his back as I kicked his legs out from under him. I turned back to the Spriggan Matron who was now running to me with her arms wide, I began running to her and almost leaped into her embrace, my darkest fears faded away.

"My child..." She chittered into my ear in the language of spriggans, "I was so afraid they would kill you."

"They tried to mother," I chittered back to her, my head buried into her shoulder. "You taught me to well for them to be able to though." At this I heard Ralof groaning as he picked himself off the ground and began looking for his axe.

"Why do you have one of them with you? You know they are dangerous."

"I'm guessing you know this spriggan?" Ralof said as he picked up his axe and put it back on his belt.

"Yes, he does know me, human." My mother said in plain speech. "I am his mother. I took him in when bandits tried to kill him as a child, after they invaded my lair." Hearing her speak to him left him with his jaw hanging once again. "We must go, the dragon will not destroy that village forever, and will probably seek any survivers to feast on." With that, she put her arm around my shoulders, and proceeded to lead us out of the cave.


	2. Chapter 2

Sundas, 1:20 PM, 17th of Last Seed, 4E 201

The three of us exited the cave, to my great joy, though only Mother could really tell. we immediately heard loud flapping, and Ralof gave a small call of warning for us to duck down as the dragon passed over us.

"There he goes, looks like he's gone for good this time." He said as it turned North, flying well passed the town and out of sight.

"We must be cautious, as more soldiers will undoubtedly come to investigate what happened." Mother said in the common speech.

"I have to agree with her," Ralof said, "we will need to get out of here before the Imperials start swarming the area. If you want, you could come to Riverwood and see my sister Gerdur at her mill."

"What type of mill, dare I ask?" I replied.

"Um... a... lumber mill..." he said, quite obviously worried that we might kill him for even mentioning it.

"I see," Mother began, " we will have to make our way there, preferably together as to avoid trouble." Both Ralof and I nodded at this, and we began to make our way there. The trip was hardly eventful, we stopped for a moment at the "Guardian Stones" as Ralof called them, and told me to see if I could activate them. Upon trying the mage stone, it began to glow slightly, and shoot a faint beam of light into the air.

"Mage, eh? To each his own, who am I to judge after all?" He replied as we watched the beam dissappear.

"We should continue to Riverwood." I said to him, hardly caring for a minor illusion from long ago, though I could feel my magicka flowing slightly smoother.

We continued north, pausing only to fight off some wolves who attacked us, to the disdain of Mother, who chittered quietly to herself about how we never would have seen them if Ralof wasn't with us. Shortly after that, we made it to Riverwood, just barely an hour after leaving the tunnel in fact. I heard Ralof mumble something to me about the news of Helgan not spreading this far yet, not to my great suprise, even that kind of news wouldn't travel this fast. As we walked into the hamlet, I noticed that mother and I were drawing slight attention from the locals, notably the blacksmith and some Bosmer who was carrying some lumber. We continued over the small bridge to the mill, and I began to look over the setup, noticing that it was highly similar to others I had seen on my travels. Simple, water powered to avoid cost of labor. I soon heard Ralof talking to his sister and noticed mother was waving me over.

"I want you to avoid a fight as much as possible, my child." She chittered to me, getting a nod of understanding back from me. I hardly wanted a fight myself, though I would gladly chew out this Gerdur for cutting down so many trees and not planting new ones, if it were the case.

"Hey, come on!" I heard Ralof call us, more than likely wanting to introduce us to his sister. However, as soon as she saw Mother , she pulled out the dagger she had on her hip, likely planning on attacking her. This proved useless as I was next to her with her own dagger at her throat, her hand still around the blade, and my sparks spell aimed at her heart, a fearless glare over my face. "Hey! There's no call for that!"Ralof said, clearly worried that he might lose his sister to a fight she tried to start. I dropped her hand and pulled my spell away from her chest, being ready to cast it if she tried anything again.

"Ralof, why do you have an elf and a Spriggan of all things traveling with you?" She asked him with a glare.

"Because he helped me escape from Helgan, and the Spriggan is apparently his adoptive mother." The look that Gerdur had on her face was one of shock, not to my great suprise. "It also turns out that he is the secret son to Jarl Ulfric."

"Impossible! He's a High Elf! He,"

"Gerdur, Ulfric already admitted it to me, he was something that happened during a drunken night with one of his servants."

"I'm hardly suprised to hear that." I finally spoke up, tired of hearing them bicker already. I noticed another nord adult approach, followed shortly after by a young boy and a dog. I began to ignore the group as I wandered over to a large stump, and began counting the many rings on its surface. As I passed one hundred and fifty, I heard the soft footsteps of Mother come up to me and sit down beside me.

"You've always enjoyed counting tree rings." She began, "when you were much younger, you also loved to hear me tell you the story the rings told. But when this war started, you began to be too worried to do even count them... what changed to make you start again?" She asked me softly.

"I saw my father..."

"At the human fort?"

"Yes... I realized I didn't know how to react when I did see him. I... I'm afraid I might have put off the wrong message when I saw him."

"How so?"

"I was rather cold and distant to him... and I probably shouldn't have done so..." I once again felt her wrap her arm around me, and began stroking my cheek, trying to comfort me for the moment.

"You are such a strong child, it would be hard for me to expect you not to let your emotions slip like this if I didn't know you so well." At this she reached around me and pulled me into a full hug, I let my head rest in the nook of her shoulder for a few minutes as I tried to get my emotions squared away. What I hardly expected was for her to start humming a song she would sing to me when I was a child, back when I was afraid of thunder and lighting. This caused me to have more trouble then before. Shortly after she finished, I heard a female clear her throat, which made me immediately put up my emotional barriers once again as Mother let me go so she could turn and look to see who was there.

"I have a favor to ask of you... but firstly I'm sorry for comming to a conclusion so quickly about the two of you."

"Apology accepted." I said, and Mother nodded to her.

"Thank you. Now the favor is that I need you to go to the Jarl over in Whiterun, he needs to know that there is a dragon around."

As she finished saying this, I looked to the sky, I judged the time to be at least half past four due to the sun's position in the sky. I looked at Mother, "What do you think? Should we risk violence to warn the humans?" I asked her in our chittering language.

"Unfortunately, I think we should. I would gladly be done with them so we could return home. But if the dragon comes to our cave, we might not have a home to return to." She chittered back sadly.

"Alright... we'll go, but we'll do so tomorrow, it is to late to start traveling now." I told Gerdur.

"That'll be fine, so long as we try to get some soldiers to protect this village. You do know where Whiterun is, right?"

"Yes, it's just a few hours walk north of here, passed the waterfall. I've seen it from the woods in our travels."

"Good, I'll let the innkeeper know not to try and kill the two of you if you decide to spend the night there. Do you have enough gold to stay there?"

"I should hope so, so long as the innkeeper doesn't charge me much more then a few hundred gold." I said as I lifted my very full gold pouches to show they had at least a thousand gold in them.

"How did you get so much gold?" Gerdur asked, clearly mystified.

"I took it off the corpses of imperial soldiers, plus the biggest bag is a collection I made over most of my life. Now I need to get going so I can get supplies for our journey tomorrow. I'll probably start at the blacksmith's forge, then make my way to the general store across from there." With a nod she turned and left in the direction of the inn.

Before I could get up, I felt Mother's hand on my shoulder. "I'm proud of you, but are you sure we should spend the night in town? You never know if someone will try something while we sleep..." She chittered to me.

"I know, but at least we'll have more of a warning if the dragon attacks if we're in town." I chittered back, getting a nod in return.

We got up after that and made our way to the blacksmith's forge. He raised his eyebrow in slight puzzlement, not likely understanding how an elf and a Spriggan would be traveling together. Though he was happy enough to trade products with me. I ultimately sold most the armor I picked up on my way to town, and ended up buying a suit of well worn studded armor, light enough to not get in my way, but strong enough to take a blow, and a steel short sword. I also got a simple steel dagger for Mother, though she hardly wanted it, but eventually came around. After that, we made our way to the general store, and as soon as we walked in we heard fighting going on. As we waited for them to finish, the man who seemed to run the place noticed us, and quickly backed up as he saw Mother standing next to me. This caused the woman turn and gasp. I merely raised one of my eyebrows thinking that their reactions could've been quite faster if they focused on their work instead of arguing.

"Um, are you a customer?" I nodded at this and they relaxed. I began selling items to him that Alvor the blacksmith wouldn't buy, rings, some fresh produce, even a couple books and a garnet. I then bought him out of health and magicka potions, and picked up a couple spell books, one of clairvoyance, and another of candlelight. After we finished, I asked him about the argument they were having. It would turn out that a robbery took place in his store, and the culprits escaped to the barrow on the mountain. I told him if we passed by we would see about getting his item back.

We then made our way to the inn up the street, passing a drunk who didn't even notice us in his stupor. We made our way inside and found the woman in charge, she was still cautious around us despite the warning from Gerdur not to start anything.

"I expect you'll be wanting the room we have for rent?" She asked, to which I gave her a nod. "Fine, it'll be twenty gold for the night." I quickly counted out the coins and handed them to her, which seemed to satisfy her well enough that she turned and left us alone.

The room we rented from her for the night was small, hardly unexpected, it had one bed on it, which Mother sat down on. It was little more than some wood covered with some furs, but compared to the wooden cart I rode on previously, it would be nice. I closed the door and turned around to notice Mother motioning for me to lay down next to her. This was hardly unusual as she often layed next to me to try and keep me warm at night over the years. This seemed no different, and proved to admit I was correct, as I put my supplies on the floor, got out of my armor, and laid down next to her, feeling her instantly grab ahold of me, pulling me into a hug. I realized the candle was still flickering, and with a huff, Mother allowed me to move enough to blow it out. As I once again began to drift off to sleep, I heard her begin to hum her song. As I fell into unconsciousness, I felt her kiss my forehead goodnight.


	3. Chapter 3

I awoke to the sound of thunder, and mother toying with my hair.

"What time is it?" I softly asked in our chitering language.

"Not yet dawn, sweetheart. The storm has just blown in, and may take most of the morning to blow over. Get some more rest while you can."

As I lay there, I felt myself drift off once more, dreams and memories passing by in the blink of an eye, until I felt myself being sat up. I slowly opened my eyes and saw mother picking mites off my legs with her delicate, yet strong fingers.

"We traded staying dry for being eaten alive." she said as she saw my eyes open. "We should've looked for a cave instead of staying here, or a thick tree..." She continued to gripe as I attempted to wake myself from my slumber.

"Has the rain stopped?" I asked her as I rubbed my eyes.

"Not yet, but I think we should leave regardless. I don't like these nords any more than those imperials that took you from me." I nodded and began to get my armor on, noting a soft sigh from mother as she looked at the leather pieces. "How many animals must perish to provide clothing for such barbaric species?"

"Too many as always. Though the protection from the cold of this land will make it necissary for quite some time."

We left our room and walked out of the inn as we begun the walk to Whiterun, not getting two steps before we heard the store owner swearing at an elf running up the path and over the bridge.

"Blasted thief! Probably on his way to the barrow with my claw too..." he griped as he walked back to his shop.

"Should we help get his claw back?" I asked mother. "It's a bit of a walk, but we would be inside and protected from the rain instead of the long trek through this drizzle." I reasoned.

"If you believe it would be wise, then we can go, but we should get to Whiterun to warn them of the dragon."

"Mmm, you're probably right...to Whiterun then." And so the trek began.

We saw an elk shortly after crossing the bridge, a few wolves on the way down the hill, and a few Thalmor (Two Inquisitors[one male, one female] and a male soldier) that were quickly grasped in vines that emerged from the ground and pinned to the nearest trees. I took the hooded robes, boots and gloves from the male inquisitor that happened to be near my height, and the elvish daggers from them all.

"Why are you doing this?" the female Inquisitor asked panic and anger in her voice.

"This is a partial payment to the destruction of these lands because of the war your kind started." I said before slitting her throat. "Leave the others bound." I said to mother as I searched the inquisitor for paperwork of any kind, finding only orders to destroy a shrine of Talos from an E.

Taking the paper and putting it in my pouch before turning and returning to our walk. After a short while, we found our way near what smelled to be a meadery. only a short walk from that, was a farm, and a small battle between a giant and some warriors. However the battle was cut short when I expertly tossed one of the elvish daggers into the eye of said giant. It paused before collapsing to its knees and then onto its face.

"How did you do that?" a woman in what looked like old nordic armor asked as she sheathed her bow.

"Years of practics on targets more elusive." I commented as I pulled the dagger from the giant's eye.

"You would make for a fine Shield-brother." she said as I cleaned the dagger on the giant's clothing.

"Perhaps, but I wouldn't count on me joining unless need for me to do so arises." I said, replacing the dagger in my sheath and returning to mother on the path to town.

"And why is that?"

"Because I can hit a skeever from half a mile away with an ice spike." I said as I turned and launched said spell perfectly between the string and wood of her bow only for it to hit a boulder on the hill far behind her. Not a one of them were able to find words as their mouths hung agape.

Shortly after we made it to the city gates only to be stopped by a pair of nervous guards eyeing mother with their hands on their weapons.

"City's closed due to rumours of the dragon attack. You'll have to return some other time."

"Not likely as we bring word from Riverwood that they request aid from the Jarl to prepare from said dragon." I replied.

"Riverwood's in danger too? You're right, you should get up to Dragonsreach and inform the Jarl." he said as he turned and unlocked the gates. "Dragons, vampires and the war, Skyrim's truly falling apart." he mumbled as we entered the city.


End file.
